AFRICA AGRICULTURE STATUS REPORT 2016

that would likely affect the contribution of agriculture to
the overall economic transformation agenda. Hence, the
rest of this section discusses five overarching megatrends
in the African economic landscape that would likely affect
agriculture’s contribution to future economic transformation
in the region over the next decade. Secondly, with the
understanding that the trajectories of these megatrends are
not inevitable and are amenable to policy investments, we
discuss key areas for intervention that would allow African
policymakers to bend these trends in socially desirable
directions.
The following five trends are highlighted as among the
megatrends affecting Africa’s agriculture in the next few
decades.
a. Labor force expansion and youth bulge
Africa is a youthful continent with over 60 percent of its
population below the age of 25 (World Bank, 2009). With
its labor force growing roughly 3 percent per year, over 8
million young Africans are entering the labor market each
year, amounting to about 220 million new people in the
labor force by 2035 (Fox, Haines, Muñoz, & Thomas, 2013;
Losch, 2012). The continent is thus projected to be home
to one in five of the world’s young and the world’s largest
working age population by 2040 (World Bank, 2009).
Even under the most favorable policy and growth scenarios,
less than two-thirds of this youthful workforce will find wage
jobs in the urban and non-farm sectors of the economy
(Fine et al., 2012). Most projections indicate that the
viability of farming and informal sector jobs (which are also
heavily dependent on agriculture) would determine whether
the remaining people in the labor force would be gainfully
employed or join the ranks of the unemployed (Filmer &
Fox, 2014; Yeboah & Jayne, 2016). The unemployment
scenario would surely lead to political and/or social unrest.
The growing young population is resourceful, innovative,
and adventurous and thus represents a great asset for
improving productivity and economic growth in all sectors
including agriculture.
The sheer size of the youth population makes it a critical
force in creating an effective demand for agricultural
products in the region, if their purchasing power is
enhanced. Also, as the largest share of the workforce,
youth are an important source of agricultural labor. Their
dynamism and adaptability could also be harnessed to
implement the technological changes required to transform
Africa’s agriculture. However, the youth are typically viewed
as uninterested in agriculture, as they find the existing form
of back-breaking and low productivity agriculture extremely
unattractive.
Those with a predilection for agriculture also face significant
barriers to entering agriculture, including a lack of access
to land and financial services (Bezu & Holden, 2014).
Fortunately, policy and public investments can create an
enabling environment that improves the profitability and
attractiveness of agriculture and agri-food value chains to
position the continent to reap a demographic dividend from
its growing youthful workforce.
b. Rapid urbanization, emergence of a middle class, and
diet transformation
Africa’s urban population is growing rapidly, but the rate
at which the region is urbanizing is slowing down (United
Nations, 2016). Despite considerable country-specific
variability, a major underappreciated demographic fact over
the past few decades is that Africa’s urban population growth
is mainly due to natural growth of the urban population (birth
rates minus death rates of people residing in urban areas)
and reclassification of formerly rural towns as urban once
a threshold number is reached (Bocquier, 2005; Moriconi-
Ebrard, Harre, & Heinrigs, 2016; Potts, 2012; United
Nations, 2016). Rural-to-urban migration appears to have
slowed down considerably in most of SSA, and is no longer
as important a driver of urbanization as it was between the
1960s and the 1980s. Also, with rapid population growth,
another key source of urbanization is the proliferation of
secondary towns and cities, which are also growing at least
about the same rate as the larger cities (Christaensen &
Todo, 2015). Despite urbanizing rapidly, SSA will still be the
least urbanized region of the world by 2050 (United Nations,
2014).
At the same time, some studies provide evidence of a
rising middle class in Africa estimated at about 350 million
people in 2010 (AfDB, 2011; Deloitte and Touche, 2013;
Kearney, 2014; Tschirley et al.,2015). On this basis they
project a rapid modernization of Africa’s food systems and
diets, with major employment growth being envisioned
in the downstream stages of the food systems. However,
these conclusions are highly sensitive to how middle class
is defined. Some scholars argue that urban income growth
is quite narrow in most African countries and hence may
generate weaker growth and employment multiplier effects
than if it were broad-based (Gollin, Jedwab, & Vollrath, 2013;
Jedwab, 2013; Potts, 2013). For instance, Figure 3.5 shows
that the third and fourth income quintiles, ostensibly the
“middle class”,are declining in terms of their share of total
income in Nigeria and Zambia over the past 25 and 17 years
respectively. This skewed distribution of wealth raises the
question of whether Africa is really making progress toward
a rising middle class, or whether we are really seeing rising
incomes at the top, and a declining share of income for not
only the bottom 2 quintiles but the 3rd and 4th as well.
58 AFRICA AGRICULTURE STATUS REPORT 2016